Toques Behind the Pushcarts

If we need more signs of how bad it is out there for cooks, let’s turn to the Hot Dog Indicator.

Larry Bain and Sue Moore, who run hot dog carts in San Francisco and Los Angeles, were looking for some part time help. Now mind you, their Let’s Be Frank carts are up the culinary scale. The dogs and brats are made from pasture-raised beef from the Panorama rancher cooperative and humanely raised pork. They’re served with fresh grilled onions on buns from Acme Bakery. The job pays $11 to $13 depending on experience, plus tips. Not bad for a job at a hot dog stand, but it’s slinging weenies for a living.

They posted the job on Craigslist and within two hours they had seven resumes from people with serious culinary educations and cooking chops.

The applicants had, variously, 15 years experience in hotel restaurant kitchens, fluency in French and Italian, experience in cruise ships kitchens, and as corporate chefs and executive chefs.

And almost all of them had expensive culinary degrees from places like the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., or Le Cordon Bleu at the Orlando Culinary Academy.

“Oh man,” Larry Bain wrote in an email. “Hard to pay off your C.I.A. tuition loans with a part-time shift at the cart.”

Reiterating what #3 and #4 said above…$13/hour is pretty good. What do they think they’re getting paid when they graduate from culinary school and work in some of the top kitchens in NYC? Even when (especially when) the economy is GOOD?!